Flying from Peru to La Mitad del Mundo (the middle of the world), Ecuador, aka the Rose Capital of the World

We woke up at an ungodly hour very early this morning to take a flight from Cusco to Quito, Ecuador, via Lima. I felt a little sad to be leaving Cusco, as I knew there were over a dozen other beautiful and historic places we just didn’t have time to visit. And while I knew we’d still be at high altitude in Quito, I knew I’d also miss having my daily dose of coca tea provided by our historic hotel in Cusco. Coca tea is supposed to help with adjusting to altitude, as locals have known for centuries. For me, it tasted like an interesting mix of almost savory mint and herbs. While Quito is still quite above sea level at about 9,350 feet (or 2,850 meters), Cusco is significantly higher at 11,152 feet (or 3,399 meters) above sea level. Quito would be our last destination we’d hit on this trip before eventually returning to sea level in Guayaquil about an hour’s flight southwest of Quito. So it was time for us to say “adios” to Peru and “buenos dias” to Ecuador, otherwise known as La Mitad del Mundo, or the “middle of the world,” given that the equator runs right through the country; Ecuador’s name actually comes directly from the Spanish word for the equator, “ecuador,” because of this.

I have to say that on the two flights we’ve done on LATAM Airlines (first from Lima to Cusco, and this second one from Cusco to Quito) that I truly love their service. The flight attendants are always so cheerful, friendly, and eager to please. They always introduce themselves by name (after asking which language you’d prefer, Spanish or English). They always say they will do anything they can to best serve you — and it never seems like they are bullshitting you; the words are spoken with sincerity. And it never feels like you are bothering them when you ask them for something or have a question. Unfortunately, I cannot say the same for any U.S. airline counterpart. The last flight, I told them I’d prefer English. This flight, to humor myself (and to get myself to listen to Spanish better), I told the flight attendant I’d prefer Spanish. And so she continued to speak to me in Spanish and listen to my choppy, nonexistent Spanish words. She never once made me feel embarrassed or like I was an idiot.

And here’s another really kind, out-of-the-way act of service that a flight attendant did: during our flight, she could see that Kaia was being a bit fussy with us. So she randomly whipped out a little sheet of stickers along with a LATAM postcard and asked if Kaia wanted to decorate the postcard. Of course, it was stickers, so Kaia eagerly took them and started sticking away. Chris noted that while it was a LATAM postcard the flight attendant gave Kaia, the stickers were not LATAM branded. We later learned that the flight attendant just bought the stickers on her own and would take them out to appease young children having their fussy flight moments. We thanked her for her kindness and generosity and eventually got off the plane. Kaia gave back the sticker sheet but happily got to keep the LATAM postcard with all the stickers she stuck on it. It ended up being her little prized possession the rest of the trip.

We arrived in the afternoon in Quito. As we went through immigration, we were greeted with an entire wall of fresh Ecuadorian roses. Each immigration kiosk had an individual fresh rose in water. And when we walked into our hotel to check in, we were greeted with three massive vases of at least five dozen roses, all over 2.5 feet in height! I was completely floored. I do not think I’ve ever been this close to this quantity of roses, or this height of roses, in my entire life. I love fresh flowers. I adore fresh roses. But roses this tall with blooms this fat and big — I was just not accustomed to seeing. I always knew that Colombia and Ecuador were renowned for fresh flowers (I actually learned this years ago when Chris first set me a flower bouquet from The Bouqs, which tracks flowers from when they are cut at their place of origin and then go straight to your home), but today, I realized that Ecuador was likely considered the best in the world. I later learned that Ecuador is the second largest global exporter of roses in the world (after The Netherlands). The U.S. is the number one importer of Ecuadorian roses. Given Ecuador’s location with the equator line running through it, locals say that it’s the best place in the world to grow the highest quality, longest lasting roses. Someone at the hotel told us that while the average roses from elsewhere may be lucky to last six to seven days in a vase with changed water, Ecuadorian roses are so high in quality that when properly cared for, they can last over two weeks!

I don’t know what it is about “long stemmed” roses that get me. But these were most definitely extra, extra long-stemmed, and this made them even more breath taking and regal. It’s amazing what the world has to offer when you keep your eyes open for them.

Last day in Peru before heading north; little acts of kindness for Pookie

After a lot of bumpy and frustrating roads yesterday, we decided to stay local in Cusco and not do another day trip. We got around by foot (or stroller) and even explored more local areas outside of the main cobbly tourist side of Cusco.

Traveling with a toddler always gives you experiences you would not otherwise have, and it also exposes you to service that you may not otherwise get. This morning while at a local coffee shop called Paqarin Specialty Coffee, Kaia accidentally pushed the unstable table where my hot coffee had just been placed, so a bit of the coffee spilled into the saucer. A cafe employee immediately noticed this, and instead of giving us a sympathetic grin, she actually took the cup and saucer away, cleaned it up, and topped off my coffee with more coffee and hot foamy milk! This level of empathy and service never would have happened in the U.S.

We also visited the more local side of downtown Cusco, where we stumbled upon a small kids amusement park. You pay one sol each for entry, and then an additional 1-2 soles per ride. Kaia got to go on the trampoline, the carousel, and a free “plane” ride, in addition to using the play structures in the park. This was definitely excellent value for us, and Kaia was happy because she got all the rides she wanted and was surrounded by littles.

I noticed that a lot of places across Lima and Cusco sell flat chocolate circles for consumption. From what I have gathered, it seems like dark chocolate is more popular across Peru and Ecuador. When you get chocolate options here, it’s very common for the chocolate to be 60-80 percent chocolate, with the remaining percentage consisting of panela, or raw, unrefined cane sugar; milk is not a given. If you want milk chocolate, you have to explicitly ask for it. Days before, we visited a coffee shop in Lima that had an upstairs chocolate store, where they had an illustration showing all the different varieties of cacao plant/flower that exist in Peru. It should not have surprised me to learn that over 20 varieties of cacao plant are in existence, with about three main ones cultivated today for coffee consumption. In Peru and Ecuador, if you go to super local markets, you can even buy fresh cacao the fruit and eat it. We visited the Three Monkeys coffee shop in Cusco, where they had one specialty coffee drink that used cacao fruit juice (and well, I tried to ask for it, but they said that it was so late in the day that they’d already run out of the cacao juice…). Here, the baristas noticed we came in with our toddler, so he was so kind and thoughtful to heat and froth up a fresh mini hot chocolate just for Kaia. She only had a few sips, so I ended up finishing it to find tiny pieces of delicious dark chocolate that hadn’t melted on the bottom of the cup.

Coffee and chocolate culture in Peru is strong. While Peru produces only about 1.7 percent of the world’s cacao beans, the quality is most definitely very high here. I definitely felt like I got more complex fruity flavors out of the high percentage chocolate we tasted here. I feel like this was the beginning of my (very late) realization that chocolate, like coffee, tea, or wine, can also be very complex on its own, that it doesn’t really need much sugar or even any milk to be delicious all on its own. And well, there’s more chocolate eating and coffee drinking to come in Ecuador tomorrow!

Exploring the Sacred Valley, Peru

Today, we went on a private day trip by car to the Sacred Valley and visited the Inca archaeological sites Pisaq, Moray, and Ollantaytambo, along with the Maras salt mines. Before we reached the Sacred Valley, though, the guide had us stop at a local alpaca and llama farm. While he said that the stop was for Kaia, I was actually also happy to see more local animals a bit more up close and personal. In addition to alpacas and llamas, we also saw alpaca and llama mixes, vicunas, huanacos, and Andean condors (who were rescued). I didn’t realize that alpacas and llamas actually mated, but I suppose this makes sense given that they are all from the camelid family and are mostly just of different sizes.

The four-legged animals were free to roam as they wished, but the Andean condors were in massive, tall cages; I was not expecting to see any birds of prey on this visit, but it is actually the part of this farm visit that surprised me the most. I’d never seen a bird with this large of a wing span in real life before. I’ve seen plenty of ostriches at zoos and even ostrich farms (I suppose ostriches are considered the largest living birds?), but there was really nothing like the experience of seeing an Andean condor up close in real life; I felt a bit spooked and backed up a little as it got close to me, even behind its cage. I could feel myself holding my breath as they moved around and seemed completely fine with us watching them. Andean condors are large birds of prey and feed on large, dead carcasses — the bigger, the better for them. With a wing span that be as wide as 3.3 meters / over 10.5 feet, to say they are massive feels like a bit of an understatement. There were three condors at the farm in the same large cage, and every time they spread their wings (many times!), I could feel myself shiver a little. I would not want to mess with a condor. And while I was freaked out a little by the sheer size of these birds of prey, Pookster was not fazed in the slightest. While she seemed bored of the alpacas and huanacos after a while, she was deeply interested in these large, graceful condors; Pookster wouldn’t take her eyes off them. She kept on trying to get closer and closer to them (as our guide advised that we have her back up because the condors could easily bite her fingers if we weren’t careful). She waved and smiled at them multiple times as though they were her friends. And to make it even cuter, Kaia kept repeating, “Hola!” in a soft, sweet voice to them.

I loved all the Inca sites we visited today, but if I had to pick a favorite (yeah, I know… it’s almost like picking a favorite child when you have multiple…), I’d definitely say it was Pisac. I am not completely sure why. It could be the bias because it was the very first site we visited in the Sacred Valley. But I think it’s mostly because I was so shocked at all well preserved and maintained it was. The complex was estimated to have been built around 1450. Our guide explained that when the Spanish came and conquered the Incas, the Incas had already preemptively abandoned Pisac, and so there was no real reason for the Spanish to obliterate the terraces, residences, guard posts, or religious rooms. Because you know… if people are still living there that you are conquering, you must not only kill them, but also destroy everything they have and reside in!

We asked our guide why there was no one walking around the terraced areas (which were originally built to help with irrigation and prevent flooding). He told us that originally when the sites opened, they allowed tourists to walk around them, but then they quickly realized that visitors were getting mad about other tourists being in their photos, so they ended up blocking off foot access to those areas completely!

In general, if I had to sum up themes across ancient civilizations/societies and the sites that we’ve visited across the world, I’d say they all have these in common:

  1. The killing and annihilation of people who are different than them – the affirmation of human hierarchy and racism/prejudice.
  2. Tax evasion – no one ever wants to pay taxes, and when they do, they want to pay as little as possible.
  3. Support structures for women and children – This is repeated throughout civilizations since the beginning of humankind. Unfortunately, this just isn’t the case for the United States of America, already seeing its decline in my lifetime.

History simply repeats itself when we either don’t take the time to learn it properly, or when we just choose not to understand it.

While at Ollantaytambo, we saw Macchu Picchu in the distance about 40 minutes driving time away. Our guide pointed it out to us. Of course, it would have taken far more than 40 minutes from that site to get there, plus the road conditions were so bumpy and tiring. I took a photo of the view in that direction as the sun started setting. Today as we looked out towards Macchu Picchu, that moment just kind of confirmed that I didn’t really feel like we missed out by not going to see it. Macchu Picchu will always be there if we want to return in the future when Kaia is older… and when we’re older. I love what we had the opportunity to see today in the Sacred Valley. While at Sacsayhuaman yesterday, we ran into a Canadian family of four with two kids, ages 5 and 9. They told us that they weren’t going to Macchu Picchu because they didn’t think their kids could handle it. Instead, they were spending three weeks across Peru — one week in Arequipa, one week in Cusco, and a week on the Peruvian coast. In Cusco, they would do a day trip to hike a different single site each day, and they felt very fulfilled and happy with this decision given their kids’ ages and their overall combined stamina. I think more people should see these other great Inca sites that are lesser hyped up because the beauty and culture behind them are just as rich.

We also got to try guinea pig today at the Peruvian/Inca buffet lunch during our day trip. In Andean cultures, guinea pig is considered a sacred animal, a symbol of good luck and prosperity. It’s considered an everyday food for many people in Ecuador and Peru. But alas, given Cusco gets many tourists, if you want to eat guinea pig, you have to commit to a whole guinea pig, which while it is not a large animal, the price tag is quite high even by Western standards, so it felt like a lot to spend on what would be so little food (guinea pigs are a lot of bone, not much meat). So while the buffet lunch was not an ideal or memorable meal on this trip for us, it was the perfect way to have a few bites of guinea pig to see what it was like. And well, it tasted like what I expected: chicken, or chicken breast to be more accurate given it was quite dry. There was a lot of bone and not much meat. It kind of reminded me of quail, rabbit, or frog: too many bones, cartilage, and work for the reward of itty bitty bits of meat.

Cusco, Peru: the gateway to Macchu Picchu… and 200 other beautiful places that get overlooked

Cusco, Peru, the city that is widely considered the gateway to the great Inca site Macchu Picchu, was once the former capital of the Inca Empire. Most journeys to Macchu Picchu begin with a flight, train, or bus trip to Cusco, followed by further travel to Aguas Calientes, and finally a bus or hike up to the Macchu Picchu ruins. If you have heard of ancient civilizations that are still standing, you would be familiar with Macchu Picchu. It is located high in the Andes Mountains and is considered a feat in Inca-era architecture and engineering; it also has a stunning backdrop of mountains and cloud-covered peaks. Whenever anyone goes to Peru, a usual first and expected question one will get is, “Are you planning to visit Macchu Picchu?” We got this question quite a lot.

When this South American trip was first booked, my first thought was: are we actually going to be able to see Macchu Picchu on this trip given we’re traveling with a 3.5-year-old? And after reading endless blogs, online forums, and Reddit, we ultimately made the decision that the long journey itself there with multiple transfers/modes of transportation, on top of all the altitude changes, may be a bit too much for Kaia (and us) to bear all at once. So, we x-ed out Macchu Picchu and started focusing on other areas in and around Cusco to see. Once we made this decision, though, it became very, very clear that we wouldn’t actually miss much skipping Macchu Picchu because Cusco and its surrounds have endless beautiful scenery, architecture, and other archeological sites to visit and explore. Cusco, given it’s the former capital of the Inca Empire, is a UNESCO World Heritage city in itself and could easily occupy 2-3 days of sight-seeing and eating alone, all by foot. We were told that aside from Macchu Picchu, there are over 200 other sites/hiking trails that you can visit that are within driving distance or within city limits. So, we’re exploring Cusco and taking a day trip to see different parts of the Sacred Valley tomorrow.

Today, we explored Cusco by foot. We visited Sacsayhuaman, a fortress built by the Incas in the 15th century. The complex is located on top of a steep hill that overlooks the city. While we took the stroller with us, it ended up being pretty useless because of the uneven rocky/dirt roads as well as the cobbly streets. The hike up was brutal; Chris managed to wrangle Kaia to walk the entire way up, while I had to carry our day bag along with the dreaded stroller on my own (frankly, Chris had the harder job, as I would NOT have been successful in convincing Kaia to do a steep uphill climb on my own the way he was). Along with the altitude change, it meant that the hike was hot, sweaty, huffy, and puffy, even if the temperature was only mid- to high 60s in Cusco City. We had taken altitude medication about 48 hours ahead of arriving in Cusco (having anticipated being 11,152 feet / 3,399 meters above sea level), but the air still felt harder to breathe, and each step up felt like a challenge. At Sacsayhuaman, there are megalith walls, interesting windy and dark tunnels (that also revealed how short the Incas were!), and lots of beautiful views of Cusco down below.

The site also had these huge, smooth rocks that looked like natural “slides.” We saw a number of people slide down, and Chris suggested I do it with Kaia. Once I got up there, I knew there was no way in hell I’d be able to successfully slide down with a toddler in tow; one of us (if not both!) would get severely injured, as the slide was far steeper looking down than it seemed while peering up at it. I had to have Chris come up the rocks to watch Kaia to ensure she wouldn’t do anything dangerous. I advised her several times to not move until Daddy came up. And I slid down (and shrieked the whole way given how steep it was; I later found out that I incidentally deterred and freaked out another woman who was about climb up to slide down!) and somehow ended up in one piece. I immediately stood up and was thankful I didn’t have any broken bones. Chris was able to climb up and retrieve Kaia successfully before she attempted anything crazy. Phew. We both were able to leave Sacsayhuaman unscathed and with all our bones in tact!

I later learned after I posted about visiting Sacsayhuaman on my Instagram Stories that my cousin actually broke his ankle sliding down this very rock 11 years ago on a trip here. He had done the day trip to Macchu Picchu the previous day, and he slid down this slide and thought he was successful. Unfortunately, when he slid down, his foot got awkwardly stuck in a rock, and when he tried to stand up, his ankle snapped, and that was when the breakage happened. He ended up having to be helicoptered to the nearest hospital to be bandaged up. Once I learned this (for the second time, since he did tell me this happened years ago), I said a silent prayer to myself that I hoped to leave Cusco without any broken bones.

Circuito Magico del Agua in Lima and entertaining a toddler

Yesterday late afternoon, as our last stop before heading back to the hotel to pack for the second leg of our trip to Cusco, we spent 5 soles per adult (that’s less than $2 USD each) to go into Circuito Magico del Agua, a water fountain park in Lima. I wasn’t exactly sure what a “water fountain” park would be, but it became very clear once we entered that this was meant to be like a water park (without pools) for kids and a clean, fun, water-infused park that is publicly subsidized for locals. It’s basically a place where you pay a small fee to have access to clean and safe outdoor space… and where young couples feel they can safely get away from the watchful eyes of their parents and make out with no end.

Funnily enough for us, while Chris originally planned for Kaia to run amok here in the water fountains and sprays, she ended up passing out on our way to Circuito. So for the first part of our time here, it was mostly just us walking around and taking in the scenery, and running under water fountains and seeing how wet (or not wet) we got. When Kaia finally did wake up, we gave her some time in the kids play area, where you pay a small additional fee to enter and your child gets 20 timed minutes to go crazy. We let her go into an up and down maze of a ball pit area, which necessitated shoes off, plus the purchase of socks for both of us (kids under age 4 need to be accompanied by a paying adult). And alas, I finally realized with this experience exactly how dirty ball pits are — with very visible evidence. In just 20 minutes of jumping, running, crawling, and sliding through an endless rainbow pit, the bottoms of both our socks were almost completely black colored. It’s no wonder some parents keep their kids away from ball pits like they are the plague.

And this morning, Kaia woke up with some boogers and a stuffy nose, and Chris credits the nastiness of the ball pit for her tiny illness.

At the airport today in Lima, Chris and I discovered first hand what “free public babysitting” can look like. We were sitting near our gate, and a girl maybe a year or two older than Kaia is jumping around. Kaia sees her and they immediately “become friends” and start playing and jumping together. They start mimicking each others’ sounds, hand motions, and jumps. They giggle and run around (in our area) together. They need very little supervision other than when they try to get too far away from us (and the girl’s dad/younger baby sibling). My concept of time is poor, but it felt like a good 45 minutes of them playing together and us not needing to shoo her away from some store, from touching something she shouldn’t be touching, or us telling her to use her “indoor voice.” It really was like free babysitting even for that short time, and it felt a bit liberating!

Chifa – Peruvian Chinese food, and fusion food in general

The Chinese diaspora is massive. It’s almost as though it’s in the Chinese DNA to travel far and wide in search of greater opportunity and the hope for a better life for the next generation. And when they have traveled, they have influenced local cuisines in the places where they’ve immigrated to. When the Chinese immigrated to the United States, many in search of gold and fortune, they modified their food to suit the tastes of Americans, which typically meant that they added more sugar to their dishes, more fried elements, as well as a greater emphasis on meat. This resulted in dishes that cannot be found in mainland China, foods like crab rangoon (which I’d actually never heard of until I moved to the East Coast in 2004) and orange chicken. In Australia, the Chinese created dim sims, which are a steamed or (more popularly) fried dumpling with a thick, crispy skin, filled with meat and sometimes shredded vegetables. And in Peru, Chinese food became so popular that it even got its own category for the fusion Peruvian Chinese cuisine: “chifa,” which derives from “ni chi fan” or “have you eaten yet?” in the Mandarin Chinese language. I was eager to see what the hype was around chifa, and on our first full day in Lima, we popped into a Chinese restaurant in Lima Chinatown to try some of this out.

Dishes that are typically recommended when trying out chifa are arroz chaufa, or Chinese fried rice with a Peruvian twist of aji amarillo paste for subtle heat; lomo saltado, or stir fried beef, onions, and tomatoes, usually served with rice; tallarin saltado, or stir-fried noodles with a mix of protein and vegetables, with a similar chili sauce added. I was warned by several travel blogs that even the smallest sizes for chifa dishes can be massive, so I should order the smallest servings to prevent too much waste. I got two dishes: the house special arroz chaufa, and the pork/vegetable stir fried tallarin. And what ended up being a little funny was that the fried rice was exactly like a really good pork/seafood fried rice would be like in New York or anywhere else in the world. It had a really strong and delicious wok hei flavor, ample pork and shrimp, lots of egg and scallions and minced vegetables. But for us, there was no distinctive Peruvian flair to it. I didn’t detect any subtle heat or aji seasoning. It was tasty, but it didn’t seem like fusion to us. Then, there were the stir fried noodles I ordered, which were tasty, but again, they didn’t have anything that made them distinctively Peruvian Chinese. The pork and vegetables were cut up fatter and larger, but that was about it. Chris said he liked the food (but was sad at the amount we couldn’t finish given the portions could have easily fed a party double or even triple our size!), but he said he felt the meal was “wasted” because we didn’t taste or discover anything particularly new or really defining “chifa” here. I did exactly what I read to do — I looked for specific dish names and ordered accordingly. But alas, I wasn’t able to get the “chifa” flavor I was seeking. At least the slightly westernized Chinese food we did end up having was tasty, though lacking in Peruvian flavors as I’d hoped.

The next fusion food I was hoping to try while in Peru was Nikkei, or Peruvian Japanese food. Unfortunately, I felt a little disappointed once again. We tried a place that was recommended from a few lists I had combed through. I ordered several Japanese rolls from a list of mostly deep fried shrimp rolls. The sauces topping the rolls were like spicy mayo / avocado based sauces. But what I didn’t like was the use of cream cheese in one or two of the rolls. I just felt like that was overpowering the seafood and the overall flavor of the rolls, and it added a heaviness that I do not normally associate with nigiri/Japanese rolls. I get why cream cheese in rolls are popular, but I was over Philadelphia rolls (salmon and cream cheese rolls) back when I was a teen.

All cuisines are evolving. It’s hard to say that one dish is more “authentic” than another because cuisines evolve with time, changing tastes, immigration, and its people. But I’ve discovered that with any Japanese food, too much added fried or “crispy” stuff or cream cheese just detracts from the overall delicateness of the cuisine for me. I’m still open and willing to try any fusion cuisine; to date, my absolute favorite is most definitely Indian-Chinese, a la my favorite restaurant Tangra Masala!), but I guess these are versions that aren’t my favorite here.

Cherimoya / custard apple = one of my favorite fruits on earth, plus the best fish stew at Surquillo No. 1 Market

I was a teen when I had my first taste of a cherimoya. I was with my parents at a Vietnamese market in San Jose, and my mom found a good deal on some cherimoyas and got a couple. Cherimoyas are usually ridiculously expensive when you are able to find them ($15-25/lb, anyone?); they are really only at ethnic grocery stores during very specific seasons of the year. My mom cut it open for us and instructed us to remove the outer green skin and to eat the white flesh, spitting out the large black seeds inside. I wasn’t sure what exactly I was eating, but I knew I was in heaven at the very first bite. Cherimoya is commonly referred to as a custard apple in English, and the name is very apt, as the texture, when ripe, truly is like a rich, fruity, almost velvety custard. The taste is hard to describe, but it’s a very tropical flavor. It’s very similar to a mix of very sweet pineapple, papaya, kiwi, and strawberry. That’s a lot of different fruit to compare it to, but that’s because the flavor is extremely sweet and very complex!

So I got my ~$2 USD cherimoya that was about 3 pounds yesterday. We ate it this morning at breakfast, and Chris got so overwhelmed by how much fruit there was and felt so full after we ate it; I have no idea what he was referring to, though. I could have eaten the cherimoya all day long and been totally fine! Today, we went to Surquillo No. 1 and 2 Market, where en route, I picked up another large cherimoya for a tiny bit more money, plus a local Edward mango, a fresh lucuma, and some maracuya/passion fruit. I’ll be the fresh fruit lady at our hotel breakfast tomorrow morning, but I have no shame and instead, will proudly carry my market-purchased, freshly washed fruit onto the breakfast floor!

While I shopped for fruit, Chris took a look at the prepared food stalls and what the locals were eating. We were likely the only tourists in the market that morning and got a lot of friendly smiles. He got us a bowl of chupe de pescado for just a couple bucks after watching all these other people come and go, happily slurping their soups from this one teeny tiny little stall. “Chupe de pescado” literally means “fish stew.” It was quite a wonder to watch the little woman behind the counter prepare it, as the stock pots seemed to almost tower over her! She had a huge stock pot with just fish stock, and another large pot with all the actual fish meat, eggs, and other seasonings. For each bowl, she strained the stock of the fish bones, then added all the accompaniments to the chupe.

I am not sure what kind of fish was in that stew. I don’t know what else was in that thick soup other than shredded and cut up fish, eggs, and some herbs. But I do know that that was likely one of the very best and richest fish soups I’ve ever had the privilege of eating. The deep yellow soup looked like it was just full of fish collagen! The stalls that only sell one or two things are always my favorite places to eat at markets when we travel. If they can make a living just serving one or two things, those one or two things must be darn good. And this was!

Lima, people who “avoid” cities, cherimoya, and lucuma fruit

We’re spending the first few days of our South America trip in Lima. As we wandered through the city and explored the main square, Chinatown (Peru has a large Chinese population that has given birth to “chifa” or Peruvian Chinese food), and Pueblo Libre, I thought about all the people I’ve met over the years, mostly colleagues, customers, and friends of friends, who have explicitly stated that they “avoid cities” when traveling. Some of them have even said they “avoid cities like the plague” and “cannot stand them” when on vacation. All of them live in suburbs or rural areas; none live in major cities. I wonder, though, when this actually became acceptable to say? To me, when I hear someone say something like this, what I actually hear them saying is, “I avoid places where there is culture and diversity. I dislike places where I can discover new things and challenge assumptions I had about the world.” Because if you actually said those last two sentences in any setting, whether it’s at work, amongst friends/family, or even to total strangers on the street, you’d appear to be an ignorant asshole who is scared of anything you are unfamiliar with. But I generally think: meh. It’s their loss that they don’t even realize is a loss, not mine, and not my problem or my bone to pick.

I’ll be honest: Lima, Peru, is not on my list of “beautiful cities.” It has fancy and wealthy neighborhoods, working class neighborhoods, areas with lots of grittiness and grime. The traffic here is absolutely horrendous with cars running red lights here and there and endless close calls with cars almost hitting pedestrians. Lane lines? What for? Just drive where you want! And from everything I’ve read, the public transit system is an inefficient nightmare. But Lima is brimming with culture, with lots of different (and indigenous) languages spoken, historic squares and streets. I was excited when I found out it was cherimoya season in Peru, and I snagged a massive, nearly 3-lb cherimoya for just over $2 USD from a friendly street vendor, whose cart was almost overflowing with heaps of fat green custard apples. He gave us samples and even gave Kaia extra samples when he saw she enjoyed the fruit. At Antigua Taberna Queirolo, one of the oldest bars and restaurants in Lima, having been around since 1880, we got to try our first pisco sours of our Peru trip (classic and maracuya/passion fruit, both excellent), plus a half/half mix of arroz con leche (rice pudding) and mazzamora morada (Peruvian purple corn pudding flavored with warm spices, pineapple, and apple). And in the evening in Pueblo Libre, we stumbled upon a little family-owned cafe/bakery where they made chocolate lucuma cake and introduced us to lucuma blended into a smoothie with milk. Lucuma is a new fruit for us. It’s native to the Andean valleys, specifically around Peru, Ecuador, Chile, and Bolivia, and is known as the “gold of the Incas.” Lucuma is round and green on the outside, and deep orange/golden yellow on the inside with an interesting starchy flesh almost like a sweet potato. The flavor is very interesting: it’s almost like a cross between a papaya, fig, and sweet potato. It goes perfectly blended with milk, and it’s a very popular fruit drink combination in Peru.

When traveling, I love visiting other cities. I love being able to see the countryside and rural areas. I love the mountains and the ocean. I love it all. But what I love most is discovering new things and new flavors (why would I travel to see the same stuff I see every day where I live?!). Lucuma wasn’t on my mental list of things to try here, but I really loved it, especially blended with milk. I will most definitely remember this fruit in the future and how unique it is.

Jorge Chavez International Airport (LIM) new terminal and its inefficiencies

Lima’s new Jorge Chávez International Airport (LIM) terminal officially opened on June 1, 2025, about four weeks before we arrived in Lima on the evening of the 28th. The new terminal is a significant upgrade, tripling the size of the old terminal and designed to handle 40 million passengers annually by 2030. While it was exciting to be in the terminal when it was so new, as Chris noted he doesn’t think we’ve ever been in an airport terminal this new, we were not quite expecting the little adventure that was to come when going through immigration and passport control.

When we landed, the first hiccup we encountered was when the jet bridge took over half an hour to actually roll out properly and allow us to get off the plane. We were all mostly sitting there, twiddling our fingers, wondering when we’d be allowed out of the plane and into Peru. Then when we arrived at passport control, a peculiar thing happened: all of the systems went down. Every computer screen we could see looked blank. No passenger who was at a passport control desk was leaving. None of the lines were moving. But they were all getting longer, and longer, and longer. Agents were tapping their keyboards over and over. Nothing was happening. While passport control and immigration areas typically have big signs everywhere saying “No mobile phone usage,” a few agents actually stood up on their tables or chairs to take videos or wide panorama shots of all the hoards and hoards of people like us, standing there waiting to clear immigration but with no clearing in sight. We waited for over an hour, and then finally, as though someone in charge actually realized how inefficient and embarrassing all this was (and how it would likely hold up other arriving planes and result in total pandemonium), we were handed little paper forms to manually fill out. Needless to say, this was a total cluster. It felt like a miracle when we finally got through. And while it was infuriating to wait, I chocked it all up to being part of the “travel experience,” a true “Welcome to Peru!” message. I smiled at the thought of it; we’re just running on Latin American time!

Shaxian Snacks – Fuzhou food

Manhattan Chinatown is known for two large groups of ethnic Chinese people: the Fujianese (specifically those from Fuzhou, a city with many surrounding villages in Fujian province, and the Cantonese (my Chinese people). So many Fujianese immigrants came in the 1980s and 1990s to New York and created little communities around East Broadway in Manhattan Chinatown, as well as in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. The area between Two Bridges in Manhattan Chinatown and Lower East Side is even considered “Little Fuzhou.”

Embarrassingly enough, even though I’ve been in New York City for over 17 years now, I haven’t really explored Little Fuzhou or Fuzhou cuisine very much. While I’ve eaten plenty of their dumplings and peanut/sesame noodles, I wasn’t sure what else to expect from their cuisine. But once Kaia started going to school in Manhattan Chinatown, I figured this was my opportunity to check out the Fuzhounese holes-in-the-wall in the ‘hood. One spot that stood out to me is called Shaxian Snacks on Grand.

Today, I ordered one of their lunch sets advertised on their menu. This consisted of a bowl of steaming hot, almost milky soup with a large handful of Shaxian bian rou, also known as Fuzhou style wontons. These are not the same at all in appearance, taste, or texture as the more famous Cantonese/Hong Kong style wontons. These are small, about bite or even half-bite-sized, and are really springy and bouncy in texture. The wonton skins are very slippery and almost translucent. I think there was just very bouncy pork inside. The soup was well flavored — it was most definitely made with pork bones and well seasoned, almost comforting in taste.

The second part of the lunch set was peanut sauce noodles, the Fuzhou way. These were also very slippery noodles, rice based, with a savory and slightly sweet sauce. The entire dish seemed so simple and humble but was really taken up a notch with the preserved, pickled minced vegetables that were sprinkled on top. Originally when I ordered it, I wondered if it would be too much food. But when I finished (all of it!), I realized that it was just enough and kept me feeling quite satisfied without feeling stuffed. And unbelievably, this was their special “combo meal” set, so it cost just $6.99, which is crazy and almost unbelievable given how much food I got, the high quality and really friendly service, plus the fact that we’re living in a high inflation period where most places are giving you less for more money!